Cotton Bowl Betting Line

On the outside of the BCS and looking in are Texas A&M and LSU who battle Friday night in the AT&T Cotton Bowl. The 75^th anniversary of this classic game will have no bearing on the National Championship but will go a long way for bragging rights between the Big12 and the SEC. The 17^th ranked Aggies are essentially playing host to the 11^th ranked Tigers from Baton Rouge and look for Texas A&M to have a huge crowd advantage. LSU is favored by two with the over/under set at 49.

Latest Texas A&M vs LSU Betting Lines

At the time of this writing, the lines are identical at each of the following online sportsbooks. We recommend Sportsbook.com for U.S. bettors because they have the easiest Visa deposit process.

2011 Cotton Bowl Game Preview

The Tigers are favorites mostly on the play of their eighth ranked defense. LSU surrenders only 301.7 yards per game and is tied for ninth in the country in scoring defense at 17.8 points per game. The biggest match-up will be LSU’s 10th rated passing defense (165.8 yards per game) against Texas A&M’s 13^th ranked passing attack at 303 yards per game.

Individually, the fringe battle will feature Tiger cornerback Patrick Peterson, who won both the Jim Thorpe Award as the top defensive back and the Chuck Bednarik Award as the overall best defensive player, against the Aggies receiving tandem of Jeff Fuller and Ryan Swope. Both A&M receivers can sting a defense. Fuller, a 6’4” junior had 65 catches for 983 yards and 12 touchdowns while Swope’s numbers were similar with 67 catches and four TD’s.

Texas A&M quarterback Ryan Tannenhill is likely to get the start on Friday after opening the season at wide receiver. Early season quarterback Jerrod Johnson was benched after a 3-3 start but might see some time as head coach Mike Sherman is notorious for cooking up trick plays in big games. The Aggies feature Cyrus Gray out of the backfield. The 5-10 junior piled up 1,033 yards on only 180 attempts taking over as the starter in October. He personally destroyed Texas with 223 yards on the ground in A&M’s massive win over the Longhorns. LSU’s rushing defense is vulnerable yielding over 140 yards per game.

Defensively, A&M is led by Von Miller who the Dick Butkus Award as college football’s best linebacker. He led the Big 12 in sacks 9 1/2. Meanwhile, LSU’s offense has been inconsistent and ranked only 107th in college football with 155.4 passing yards per game and 92nd in total offense with an average of 332.6. The Tigers ground attack will be led by Stevan Ridley, who rushed for 1,042 yards and 14 touchdowns. Jordan Jefferson and Jarrett Lee shared duties behind center combining for 1,826 yards passing, six touchdowns but an atrocious 10 interceptions.

If you are looking for an edge in this game on special teams, forget about it. For LSU kicker Josh Jasper made 83.9% of his field goals while for the Aggies, Randy Bullock hit 78.9% of his attempts: Once again, an even match-up. The team’s only common opponent was Arkansas and Texas A&M lost by seven while LSU fell by eight in their regular season finale. A slight edge here to the Tigers who lost on the road while the Aggies fell to the Razorbacks at home. The Tigers own bigger wins over Florida and Alabama while the Aggies biggest triumphs were over Oklahoma and Nebraska. If other Bowl results show anything, Florida and Alabama with wins over the Big Ten are better teams than Oklahoma (who beat a weak UConn team) and Nebraska who lost to Washington. Arkansas will defeat Ohio State in the Sugar Bowl.

2011 Texas A&M vs LSU Cotton Bowl Prediction

All signs point to LSU as being the better team but look for this to be the most competitive and most entertaining of the Bowl Games this year. I expect Texas A&M to upset LSU in overtime 31-28. I’ll also be taking the over, set at 49 at every sports betting site right now.

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